Bento is a Japanese take out meal, usually served for lunch and picnics. A bento usually consists of rice, vegetables, meat, and, sometimes, dessert. There are many types of bento. Ekibens are take out bentos sold in train stations. Hokabens are bentos from take out bento shops. An elaborate bento is called a kyaraben in which the bento is shaped and arranged like cartoon characters, animals, and other shapes.

Bento is a part of Japanese culture. Some Japanese character brands like Sanrio, hold kyaraben contests for the cutest and most beautiful bento boxes depicting their characters. http://justbento.com/3rd-sanrio-charaben-kyaraben-contest-winners-are-announced.

Although you might need a lot of practice to make elaborate bento boxes, you can prepare simple bento boxes at home.

• For variety, own several types of lunch boxes and use them interchangeably.

• Browse the net and Youtube for various cute bento styles for inspirations.

• Do not close the container when the rice is hot. The steam from the rice will make the food inside the container soggy.

A bento box is a way for Japanese people to keep their lifestyle healthy. They pack their bento boxes with a balanced diet of rice, protein, vegetables, and sometimes a dessert or other sweet treat.

You can prepare a bento box with Western food, Japanese food, or Chinese food. Ingredients for a bento box are often very simple. You can make a bento box from plain rice, add a Japanese omelet, and sprinkle it with nori. The key of preparing the best bento box is the way you arrange and present your food in attractive and neat ways.

In this guide, you will learn the basics of making your bento boxes. Follow the beginner’s guide in the last paragraph of each part to make your first bento box. You will need 1 square lunch box, 3 wieners, 1 egg, 1/2 carrot, 1/2 Japanese cucumber, 1 lettuce leaf, 1 cherry tomato, and 1 tsp of toasted black or white sesame seeds.

Some people like to use beautiful food containers as their lunch boxes. If you have spare fund, you can get thermos lunch boxes, lunch box sets, or traditional Japanese bento boxes.

You do not have to own elaborate lunch boxes or a traditional Japanese bento box to prepare your bento boxes. You can use whatever lunch box available and convenient to you, such as a plastic Tupperware container. It is important to use containers that are spill resistant, especially if you put in food with a lot of sauce or liquid.

Do invest in some accessories for your bento, especially if you use a plain lunch container. Dividers are useful to keep the different kinds of the food separated. You can also use cupcake molds as containers inside your lunch box. Little sauce bottles are attractive and practical to include sauces in your lunch box without spilling.

For this guide, you can use a plain square food container.

Rice is the main staple of Japanese dish and the main ingredient in a bento box. You can cook rice in a rice cooker.

You can make plain rice into onigiris. Onigiri is a rice ball which is shaped by hands or molds into many shapes. Traditional shapes are a triangle and a disc, but you can shape the rice ball into any shape you want with cookie cutters, molds, or by hand. Onigiri can be dipped into savory sprinkles and decorated with a nori.

You can also reheat leftover rice by making it into fried rice or into onigiri. For additional tastes, grill your onigiris with shoyu and mix them with furikake or savory sprinkles.

For this bento box, just use one portion of plain rice.

Aside from the rice, protein sources are important parts of a bento. You can include boiled eggs, Japanese omelet, any meat, or tofu to be eaten with your rice. You can use canned or frozen food if desired. If you use leftover food, reheat it before putting it in your bento box.

For this bento box, make some tulip shaped wieners and a boiled egg. To make tulip shaped wieners, take a wiener and cut it in half. Cut halfway into a halved wiener. Fry the wieners so the split parts will curl outward and shape like tulip flowers. Stick a short piece of parsley to the bottom of the tulip wiener as the flower stem. Boil the egg and cut in half.

A bento box usually includes some vegetables. Cut carrots, radish, cucumbers, or other vegetables with various shapes of cookie cutters to make the vegetables look more appealing.

For this bento box, wash the vegetables. Dry with paper towel. Boil the carrot and slice it. Shape the slices with a star shaped cookie cutter. Slice the cucumber and shape with the cookie cutter as well.

It is a good idea to separate meat or vegetables with a lot of sauce so that the sauce will not make the rice and other food soggy.

If you do not use any divider or separator in your lunch box, place the rice beneath the rest of other ingredients. If you use dividers or separators, separate the rice, meat, vegetables, and other ingredients.

By now, you will have a portion of plain rice, 6 fried tulip wieners, star shaped carrots and cucumbers, 1 cherry tomato, 1 lettuce leaf, and 1 tsp sesame seeds. Place the rice at the left side of your lunch box, leaving the right side of the lunch box empty. In the empty side of the lunch box, place the lettuce leaf and arrange your tulip wieners on top of it, leaving a little room for the boiled egg. Arrange the halved boiled eggs, yolk side up, beside the wieners. Push the cherry tomato into the middle of the rice, making it look like a Japanese flag. Arrange the carrots and cucumbers on the rice and wieners. Sprinkle the food with sesame seeds. Now you have made your first bento box.